Hampshire County Council (25 005 213)
Category : Education > Special educational needs
Decision : Closed after initial enquiries
Decision date : 27 Aug 2025
The Ombudsman's final decision:
Summary: We cannot investigate Ms X’s complaint about how the Council carried out an Education Health and Care needs assessment. This is because she has used her right of appeal to a tribunal and the issues raised are not separable from that appeal.
The complaint
- Ms X complains about how the Council completed an Education Health and Care (EHC) needs assessment for her child. She says the Council excluded relevant reports, misclassified medical diagnosis and failed to seek relevant advice. Ms X says that her son is without a compliant EHC plan.
The Ombudsman’s role and powers
- The Local Government Act 1974 sets out our powers but also imposes restrictions on what we can investigate.
- We cannot investigate a complaint if someone has appealed to a tribunal about the same matter. We also cannot investigate a complaint if in doing so we would overlap with the role of a tribunal to decide something which has been or could have been referred to it to resolve using its own powers. (Local Government Act 1974, section 26(6)(a), as amended)
- The First-tier Tribunal (Special Educational Needs and Disability – SEND) considers appeals against council decisions regarding special educational needs. We refer to it as the Tribunal in this decision statement.
How I considered this complaint
- I considered information provided by the complainant and the Council.
- I considered the Ombudsman’s Assessment Code.
My assessment
- I cannot investigate the contents of the Council’s EHC plan because Ms X has used her right of appeal about this to the SEND Tribunal.
- I also cannot investigate what reports the Council requested or included when compiling the EHC Plan. The injustice caused by any poor, or non-existent, reports is that the EHC plan does not meet the child’s needs, which is the subject of the appeal. Also, the SEND Tribunal has wide powers itself to order reports be completed.
Final decision
- We will not investigate Ms X’s complaint because she has used her right of appeal to a tribunal and the issues raised are not separable from that appeal.
Investigator's decision on behalf of the Ombudsman